Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport Karen Bradley MP confirms that the UK will be implementing the GDPR in 2018. 

Secretary of State Karen Bradley MP recently confirmed to the Culture, Media and Sports Select Committee that the UK will be implementing the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in May 2018.

In response to the announcement, the Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham recognised the importance of backing the digital economy as one of the “key drivers” for data protection change. Ms Denham explained that she sees opting into the GDPR as a “good thing for the UK”, identifying the main focus of the new and more robust rules as giving people “greater control over their data”.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK’s data protection regulator, has already taken noticeable steps in assisting businesses to prepare for the GDPR, by publishing its Guidance Roadmap (see WAB article here) and guidance concerning privacy notices under the GDPR (see WAB article here). Looking forward, the ICO has also promised to publish a revised timeline setting out the key guidance they will release over the next six months.

The question of how UK data protection law will be affected by Britain’s exit from the EU continues to cast a slight shadow over the announcement. However Mrs Bradley hints that, in the absence of any advice to the contrary, businesses should continue to prepare for the GDPR until the government takes a “look later at how best we might be able to help British business with data protection, while maintaining high levels of protection for members of the public”.

To see other WAB blog posts on the GDPR and data protection more generally, please click here to see the Data Protection section of the WAB blog.

This blog post was written by Alexander Smith, Trainee Solicitor at White & Black.